Of Tears and Origami
by Lingering Spirit
Summary: A little paper crane. How hard could it be? Miles was about to find out that it was extremely hard. Set when he, Phoenix, and Larry are in fourth grade. One-shot.


**I just realized, I haven't posted anything on this account in about a year. Whoa.**

**So, does everyone remember how at Heavenly Hall (aka the Loser's Shack) in the third game, there were these flags of a bunch of different countries strung up all over the place? If you examine them while you're playing as Edgy, you uncover a funny story about how his, Phoenix's, and Larry's class had to do origami one day. This is, basically, how I think the actually event happened. So, read on.**

**Disclaimer: Sadly, the only thing I have to do with Ace Attorney is playing the games and writing fanfiction for it. A person could dream.**

* * *

Miles was beginning to dislike art class.

Actually, dislike wasn't strong enough of a word. "Despise" might have been a better fit, or even "hate." Yes, hate was a much better word. It was amazing, how much hatred he could feel toward the little piece of paper he was trying to fold into a paper crane, but hate it he did. Intensely.

He had never tried to fold a paper crane before in his life. He'd read about paper cranes before and he knew the theory of how to fold them, but he had never actually tried, thinking that he would never have to anyway. And he probably wouldn't have, if his teacher hadn't gotten the brilliant idea to make the whole class do origami during the last period of school.

"We're going to be folding paper cranes," Mrs. Winkleman had announced as she had passed out brightly-coloured pieces of paper and instructions to every student. "It's a bit difficult at first, but if you mess up, there's more paper up front. If anyone's having any trouble, just raise their hand."

Miles was sure that _he_ wouldn't need help. He was the smartest student in the class, the one who got the best grade on every test. _A little paper crane, _he thought as he got to work on his first piece of red paper. _How hard could it be?_

Apparently, extremely hard.

At first, lots of other people had trouble. Unlike the rest of these students, however, Miles didn't raise his hand or ask his neighbours for help. He was determined to make his first crane _perfectly_, all by himself. His end result vaguely resembled a fan a little child might make out of a piece of paper to cool themselves off on a hot day.

Tossing it aside, Miles got up and hurried to the front of the room, red-faced but still determined to do this by himself. He heard someone laugh as he picked up another piece of paper, green this time. He whirled around to see who was laughing at him, but it was only one of the girls, showing her friend the rumpled but very crane-like object she had folded.

Furious at his failure, Miles stomped off to his desk and plopped down into his seat. He reread the instructions carefully, then, slowly, step by step, he began his second attempt. He was so intent on his work, which still didn't look remotely like a crane, that he didn't notice his friend Larry, on his way back to his seat from the front of the room, trip over his untied shoelace. He _did_ notice, however, when Larry's hand, flailing to grab onto something to keep himself upright, landed on his paper crane and flattened it.

"You idiot!" Miles yelled, losing his temper completely as Larry scrambled back to his feet. "You did that on purpose!"

"Miles!" cried Mrs. Winkleman from across the room, obviously shocked by his outburst. "Do not interrupt the class! If you do that again, you'll be staying behind after school for detention!"

Miles whispered an apology and examined the remnants of his paper crane. It was ruined completely. Brushing it off his desk, he stormed up to the front of the room and grabbed a yellow piece of paper before returning to his seat.

This time, before he began folding his crane, he looked around the room, watching the other students. Very few were still having trouble; the rest had folded at least _one_ paper crane. Apparently, Mrs. Winkleman had an endless supply of paper, because some of the more accomplished students had three cranes finished already.

_I have to do this,_ Miles thought angrily, looking down at the yellow piece of paper. _I will fold you into such a perfect crane that it will put these to shame! To shame!_

And yet, he couldn't bring himself to start folding the wings. Instead, he looked back around the class. He could feel his eyes stinging as he watched one girl finally fold a paper crane, and the joy on her face as she showed it to anyone who would bother looking at it. Now, there was only one other student in the class who didn't have at least one crane on his desk, a boy whom, Miles was ashamed to admit, had several failed attempts that looked more bird-like than his own did.

And then, there was that annoying knot of people not far from Miles, gathered around a desk and practically yelling at whoever sat there.

"Whoa! That's really cool!"

"How did you do that?"

"Can you make another one?"

"No, I think I've made enough."

"_Please_, Larry?"

Larry?

Miles whipped around so quickly that he fell off his chair and knocked into Mrs. Winkleman, who was heading toward Larry's desk. Caught unawares, she fell backward and landed with a thud on the floor. When Miles looked up, it was to see her seething face too close to his own for comfort.

"Miles Edgeworth!" she yelled in his face, unnecessarily loud when you considered the fact that her nose was only about an inch from Miles's. "I warned you! You will be staying behind after school for detention, young man!"

The impact of this statement felt like a direct hit to a place where no male should ever be hit. Miles had a spotless record, something he prided himself on; getting a detention would completely, unequivocally ruin that.

"N-No!" Miles cried, cursing himself as he felt tears gather in his eyes. "I've n-never got a detention before! Please, Mrs. Winkleman!"

But Mrs. Winkleman was already on her feet and, a bit more sternly than usual, she snapped at Phoenix, who sat next to Miles, "Well, what've you got to show me?"

Trembling from the shock of getting a detention, Miles slowly pulled himself up and stared at Larry's desk, both wanting and not wanting to know what he was going to find. He managed to gather up the courage to totter the few steps that lay between his and Larry's desk and peep over someone's shoulder to see what the fuss was all about.

Larry was leaning back in his chair, hands behind his head, looking much too happy for such a miserable-looking person, as everyone admired the four, brightly coloured objects on his desk. Four, brightly-coloured, perfectly-folded objects.

Miles _might_ have been able to bear the shame of not being able to fold even one half-decent crane without crying if he hadn't seen those cranes on Larry's desk. _Might_. But seeing those paper cranes, perfectly-folded, Miles couldn't help it. He started howling.

Larry's admirers were supposed to be _his_ admirers. They were supposed to fawn over _his_ four perfectly-folded paper cranes, not Larry's. They were supposed to be asking _him_ for advice to improve their own origami skills, not asking Larry.

Larry wasn't supposed to be good at origami. Larry wasn't supposed to be good at _anything_. That was like saying the sky was purple.

Everyone immediately gathered around Miles instead, trying to comfort him. Even Mrs. Winkleman tried to tell him that he couldn't be good at everything. But Miles ignored them all and kept crying, crushed by the thought that he had been bested by _Larry Butz_, of all people. He didn't stop crying until after the final bell rang and he was waiting for their bus to pull into the parking lot (Mrs. Winkleman, who was on bus duty, having taken pity on him and not given him detention).

Larry was still holding his cranes. Phoenix, who had had trouble at the start of class, held the only one Mrs. Winkleman had deemed as passable. He looked so proud of it as Miles continued to sniffle, his back to his friends.

"Hey, Miles, don't cry," Phoenix said comfortingly, patting his friend on the shoulder.

"Yeah, Edgy!" agreed Larry. "Heck, it took me a whole five minutes to get the hang of it!"

That made Miles break out into a fresh wave of crying.

"Hey, calm down, Edgy!" Larry cried, appalled. "Here, you can have one of mine!" Larry shoved a blue paper crane into Miles's hands.

Miles looked down at the crane.

Then he threw it on the ground and stomped on it.

"Miles Edgeworth!" Mrs. Winkleman sounded absolutely shocked. "How dare you be so rude! Larry was only trying to be kind! It looks like you'll be serving detention after all! Come inside right now!"

Larry stooped down and scooped up his ruined crane, his eyes full of tears. "You're really scary, Edgy," he said, his voice shaking, as Miles stormed off toward Mrs. Winkleman, too angry and ashamed about paper cranes to care about his detention.

As much as he hated art class, it was nothing compared to his new hatred of Larry Butz.

* * *

**I feel Edgy's pain. We were reading this book about a girl's life after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed in WWII, so my teacher decided it would be great if we would all fold paper cranes, as a kind of tribute to the people who died, I suppose. I suck at arts and crafts anyway, but it's still annoying when you can't get the head to work but every other kid in the room can. At least I didn't go into total meltdown. XDD**


End file.
